


Chat d'Argent

by takethembystorm



Series: Tea Break [33]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-22
Updated: 2016-09-22
Packaged: 2018-08-16 15:54:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8108413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/takethembystorm/pseuds/takethembystorm
Summary: When Marinette gets desperate, she decides to turn to desperate measures. Up to, and including, animal sacrifice.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this](http://dreamwips.tumblr.com/post/146317888424/there-is-a-french-mythological-creature-called-the).

When Marinette first hears of it, she almost bursts out laughing. A black cat? A magical black cat? Absurd. These were modern times, after all, and everyone knew that magic wasn’t real.

When Marinette hears of it next, she’s a little more desperate, and asks inquisitive questions of the wizened street magician in the green, tortoise-shell patterned robe.

“Take a chicken,” the magician says, “a fresh one, mind, freshly killed, its life-blood still warm, and call for him. Call for him, at a crossroads, at the witching hour, and he will come.”

“Thank you,” Marinette tells him.  


“But be warned,” the magician cautions, “pay him all the respects he is due, pay him his respects, as befits a guest, or he will abandon you, and all the luck and fortune he brings will disappear with him.”

“I will,” Marinette says.

Three nights hence, with the half-moon shining wanly across the sleeping city, Marinette takes the elderly rooster she’d purchased and binds its beak and feet and wings, then tucks it beneath an arm. She dons her cloak, the rooster an odd-shaped bundle beneath it, grips a kitchen knife firmly in her free hand, and trots out into the building mist.  


At the stroke of three, she reaches the crossroads.

The rooster is oddly calm as she pins it carefully to the ground, positioning the edge of the knife at its throat.

“Chat Noir,” she calls softly. “Chat Noir, Chat Noir.”

The knife makes a clean stroke across the rooster’s throat, spilling a smooth-gleaming pool onto the thirsty earth.  


And in the space between one breath and the next, a lean black cat appears before her, so suddenly that Marinette near screams in surprise.

“You have called,” the cat purrs, “and I have answered. Speak quickly.”

Marinette gathers herself. This was a dangerous creature, a creature of witchcraft and a servant to ungodly forces, but she needed it, and needed its help.

“Chat Noir,” she says, “my landlord, my parents’ landlord, he has increased our rent, and we cannot pay. I beg of you, please help us.”

“You wish only for coin?” the cat says. “It will be done.”

With that, the cat snaps the rooster up in its jaws and vanishes as suddenly as it had come, leaving behind only the puddled blood and Marinette, kneeling in the dust.

She waits for an hour, maybe an hour and a half. The blood congeals, the moon sinks towards the horizon, the mist sinks into her cloak and dress until she shivers with the cold.

She goes home and lays herself down to sleep, disheartened.

When she wakes, something warm is curled up against her stomach, and something cool and heavy sits in her loosely curled fingers.  



End file.
